Territorial Governor James Miller Arrives at Arkansas Post

When territorial governor James Miller arrived at Arkansas Post in late December 1819, he was not impressed by what he found: a small settlement whose residents seemed more interested in gambling and socializing than community building. In a February 1820 letter to the Secretary of War, Miller wrote, “I should not have resigned, if I had known as much about this country as I now do.”

When, in October 1820, the Territorial legislature voted to move the capital to Little Rock, the site was even less developed than Arkansas Post. A handful of modest wooden buildings stretched from the riverbank south as far as today’s Seventh Street; at least two sold whiskey.

But, the Little Rock town site offered several advantages over Arkansas Post: it was close to the geographical center of the new territory; it was less swampy and flood-prone than the Post and it also lay at the point where the Southwest Trail, a long-established route through the woods, crossed the Arkansas River.

Even before the town of Little Rock was laid out, two competing ferries operated in the vicinity. Thus, the new capital occupied a vital crossroad of the major transportation routes through the territory, boding well for its future prospects.

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On the day after Christmas of 1819, a keelboat arrived at Arkansas Post, bearing General James Miller, who had been appointed Governor of the new Arkansas territory on March 3rd of that year.

Official business and travel delays had slowed Miller’s progress from his New Hampshire home toward Arkansas but in his absence Kentuckian Robert Crittenden, the Territorial Secretary, had moved to set up the new territory’s government.

The first meeting of Arkansas territory’s elected legislators convened at Montgomery’s tavern in Arkansas Post in February 1820.

The quarrelsome first session produced a bill calling for the territory’s capital to be relocated to Cadron, a small settlement near present-day Conway.

The bill was amended to substitute Little Rock for Cadron, and then tabled until the fall session. By the time the solons reassembled in October, tempers cooled and Little Rock emerged as the favorite site for the territorial capitol.

Every December, visitors to Arkansas’s Capitol witness the tradition of elaborate seasonal decorations.

But Christmas decorations in public buildings were uncommon before the 2nd decade of the 20th century.

In Arkansas, there was no recorded official decoration of the State House or the Capitol until 1938, when Arkansas Secretary of State C.G. “Crip” Hall, recently re-elected for a second term, resolved to do something to cheer young patients at the nearby Arkansas Children’s Infirmary, known today as Arkansas Children’s Hospital.